ABSTRACT
Since the Yom Kippur war, either owing to the Arab-Israeli conflict or the Iran-Iraq war, the arms race in the Middle East has reached a higher level of armament both in quantity and in quality. Since the early 1970s, the Syrian economy has benefited from its oil resources, either by reduction of the oil imports bill or in earnings as a net exporter of oil. While oil contributed up to 10 per cent of total Syrian annual earnings from exports in the 1970s, oil exports earned about two-thirds of Syrian yearly exports in the 1980s. The reliance on additional foreign resources to the economy has been a decisive factor in securing economic development and in preventing a sharper decrease in the standard of living. The combination of the physical supply of huge quantities of modern arms with very flexible financial terms has been vital to Syria’s defence interests.
